Motherhood Quotes

It seems to me that since I've had children, I've grown richer and deeper. They may have slowed down my writing for a while, but when I did write, I had more of a self to speak from.

My existence began the day you were created and was realized the day we met.

So, a word to all you Femin-Idi-Amins: Stop “liberating” moms by trying to
make them join the workforce. They’re already doing the job that God put
them here to do: Everything.

American culture at large has failed working mothers.

When we combine very real workplace inequalities with these romantic opt-out stories, the idea that "having it all" is a laughable goal becomes enshrined as immutable truth. And when we portray opting out as a simple matter of "choice," we ignore the systematic problems that make combining work and motherhood so difficult.

my mother, poor fish,
wanting to be happy, beaten two or three times a
week, telling me to be happy: "Henry, smile!
why don't you ever smile?"

and then she would smile, to show me how, and it was the
saddest smile I ever saw

A first child is your own best foot forward, and how you do cheer those little feet as they strike out. You examine every turn of flesh for precocity, and crow it to the world. But the last one: the baby who trails her scent like a flag of surrender through your life when there will be no more coming after-oh, that' s love by a different name.

The best way to keep children at home is to make the home atmosphere pleasant, and let the air out of the tires.

I think that the best thing we can do for our children is to allow them to do things for themselves, allow them to be strong, allow them to experience life on their own terms, allow them to take the subway... let them be better people, let them believe more in themselves.

Oh, Marilla, I thought I was happy before. Now I know that I just dreamed a pleasant dream of happiness. This is the reality.

Mama said it's probably because of Suzanne, and that you are never the same after a child dies. That made me wonder what she was like before Clover died, because I don't think I really knew my own mother until I had children, and if she was different before, I don't remember.

...always-
the sharp,
plaintive edge
on the rim
of the spoon
of my giving.
(lines 8-13 of the poem 'Confessions')

I stumble and fall.
I weep and struggle to rise.
My mom feels it all.

Well, knowledge is a fine thing, and mother Eve thought so; but she smarted so severely for hers, that most of her daughters have been afraid of it since.

It's not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It's our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel and heartless.

Let your children uplift your burdens and allow your role as a mother - to flourish and grow.

Motherhood furnishes us with, not just giving life - but, partaking of life’s learning.

It is within your loving and welcoming arms that a new generation will arrive & be greeted.

Motherhood unwittingly molds us into all we are now, or are - destined to be.

You don't need to be primary caregiver of your children to be of primary influence in their lives. What you do for them behind the scenes in your own unique way is what makes the true difference in the long run.